The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1887-01-27
BILL ARP TALKS.
In Ills Usual Quaint and Humorous Way

Do we want any more farmers? The
newspapers say we do and maybe they
know what is best for us, but if seems to
me we have got enough, such as they
are. We want better farmers. Wewant
farmers who can make farming pay.
Nine.teuths of our farmers just barely
squeeze along. They don't n'taccumulate-
they can't. 1t takes a very smart man
to make any surplus at farming and
smart men are scarce. Most of our far
mers work hard and do their best, but
not one in ten can get ahead if there is
dependent family to support. Most OF
them get behind and belong to some
body. They are under mortgage. Our
newspapers make a big fuss over man
who is making money by farming. His
name and his crop is handed around.
There are about ten i'll county and
there ought to be fuss made over them
They are the exceptions, not the rule.
Those ten have got or have had some
special advantages that the masses of the
farmers have not. Now and then you
can find man who would get rich any
where at anything, but he is apt to be
mean and INSCRIPTIONS. Let US take
humanity as it is, and it is fact that our
farmers are discouraged and have reason
to be. Rowland rents land from me.
He is a better farmer than the average
he works hard and never gets tired and
never complains. He has a wife and five
small children. He owns a good mule
and a wagon and cow and some hogs.
He never goes in debt. He owes no man
anything, and feels his independence ;
but Rowland does not make any surplus
nothing but q slim support. A big
doctors bill would ruin him. If his
mule was to die or sorae rascal was to
steal her, Rowland wouldent get over it
in FIVE years. Mrs. Rowland helps her
husband all that she can; she raises
fowls and sells chickens and eggs: she is
economical and prudent, and Rowland is
strictly temperate. So now what is the
matter? think that if the wheat crop
had not been failure last year Rowland
would lave gotten ahead little, but
something fails most every year. If the
product does not fail the price does.
With cotton at eight and half cents a
pound he gets about fifty cents a day for
his labor-perhaps less. he could get a
dollar day in the mine, that are near
by. Why is it that everything prospers
but farming? The towns and cities are
growing rich. The country keep poor.
Cities get on boom and capital flows to
them in stream, but there is no boom for
the country. No wonder that our ambi'
tious young men flock to the towns. !
have been writing up the country for ten
years and trying to entice our educated,
progressive young men to go to the
country and farm intelligently and be
happy, but in vain. They are smarter
than thought. They see the merchant
getting rich and the farmer getting
poorer, and so they try merchandise or
some other town occupation. Most
everybody is going to town that can get
there. My nsbors are all gone or going.
Nabors Aubrey and freeman and Dob
bins aud Cotton and Keever and Mont.
gomery and Buford used to farm near
me, but they are all gone, gone to town.
Their farms are occupied by somebody
negroes mainly.
Do you think we want more farmers ?
Will more farmers make farming pay
better? Will it make farming lands
worth more money? Barlow county
averaged ten dollars an acre few years
ago. They don't average but seven now.
Will more farmers increase their value ?
No. The value of our lands depends
upon what we make upon them, and we
can't make anything now. The staple
crops are too low, and we have no mar
ket for the side crops or those from the
garden and orchard. There is too great
competition among the farmers and not
enough consumers.
What we want is greedy market
not a glutted one. We want manufac-
lures, artisans, mechanics of every kind
lots of them, aud then farming will
thrive, and not until then.
Only twenty per cent. of the popula-
ton of Pennsylvania are farmers, and
her lands were returned in 1880 at s49
per acre, and the average general product
of each farm worker was $500. -Four
hundred dollars for one laborer on the
farm. Think of that. No wonder the
lands are high.
Georgia has seveaty-6ye per cent. of
her population on the farms, and her
farming lands average four dollars per
acre, and the average of farm labor is
one hundred and forty dollars per an.
mum.
And SO it is with all the States. The
rule is as fixed as law of nature.
Farming land rents in England at an
average of sixty dollars an acre, that is
the rent paid, not the value of the land.
The more farmers the less the value of a
farmers labor. It is the manufacturers
that stimulate the farming business and
make it pay. In Pennsylvania twenty
farmers have eighty people TO feed who
are not farmers. Eighty mouths open,
and hungry and ready to buy. In Geor-
gia twenty farmers have only seven to
feed. Think of that.
No, we do not want any more farmers,
neither from home nor abroad. We
want manufactures. The broom factory
at Acworth is worth more to Cobb county
tL,a do,o, nau f,rnoera nominp in